Poetry in Motion

Elbow propped up against thick glass
the same surely sourced for orphans’spectacles
I see the second hand of a usually-familiar watch
ticking, travelling backwards.
Beyond that, scene switches, from urban to paysan
transmitted by the eye not caught in reverse time:
regardless of us, continues the world outside.
Along with time marching anti-clockwise
in the window are reflected others’ elbows
computer terminals and conversations
in one’s ear or to real neighbours.
There are peaceful readers or drumming of fingers,
with or without wedding bands.
Reconciliation of the pastures new
gone before they are even seen;
reconciling them with the world inside,
static, and blind
leaves me as if leeched, less alive.
What if watches really ticked this way
and in someone else’s thick glass, my clockwise
was a surprise,
a strange arrangement, keeping uncommon time?
What change to my name, to this, to any train,
to the wedding bands or these conversations?
Would I be still here – or at least somewhere,
or in this other world, would I be nowhere?
Would you still be waiting
smiling, at the station
for me,
or would I lose you, to another?